1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to improvements in safety glazing construction particularly, laminated safety glass windshields having a soft plastic inside layer.
2. Description of Prior Art
In general, safety glass consists of a single sheet of tempered glass with an elastic material which forms a protective layer. The elastic coating prevents lacerations from occupant impact to the windshield during a collision. Due to its elasticity, the protective layer also absorbs small scratches and other surface deformations which may result, for instance, from cleaning the windshield. Safety glass is especially useful as vehicle windshields as shown in French Pat. Nos. 1,425,292 and 2,134,255 and German Patent No. 1,696,051.
It has become a common practice to affix various labels to vehicle windshields, particularly to the inner surface of the windshield. For example, in certain European countries, a tax label must be glued to the inner surface of all windshields. This label indicates payment of a required vehicle tax. In this country, many state laws require safety inspection stickers to be affixed to the inner surface of vehicle windshields. These labels must be securely affixed to the windshields, yet they must be removed and replaced periodically, e.g. yearly. To remove the label, it is often necessary to scrape it from the window using a sharp instrument such as a knife or razor blade. When the windshield is constructed of safety glass coated with a protective layer, scraping the protective material to remove the label may damage said protective layer, particularly if this layer consists of a relatively soft plastic. The present invention discloses plastic coated safety glass having a delineated area of its surface comprising a hard, scratch-resistant material to which a label may be affixed. Thus, any damage to the protective plastic layer occasioned by scraping off the label is eliminated.